Tomorrow's Cinco De Mayo! - Make Your Own: Taco Seasoning

Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo and White Moms all over America will be making tacos for dinner because tacos are the only Mexican food we know how to make.

It doesn't get much easier than browning ground meat in a pan, draining the grease from the pan, opening a packet of taco seasoning mix, sprinkling it on the meat, adding water and heating it up. 

What's in that taco seasoning mix? It's just spices and herbs, right? Wrong. Here is the list of ingredients from a packet of Old El Paso Taco Seasoning Mix:

*Maltodextrin
Salt
Chili Pepper
Onion Powder
**Spice
*Monosodium Glutamate
Corn Starch
Yellow Corn Flour 
Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil
*Silicone Dioxide (anticaking agent)
**Natural Flavor
*Ethoxyquin (preservative)

*=Say what?
**=Can you be more specific? 


Are you ready to make your own taco seasoning and never spend $1.00 on one of those sodium stocked, preservative filled packets again?

Here's what you need (and you probably already have all of it in your kitchen):

4 Tablespoons Chili Powder
2 Tablespoons Cumin
2 Tablespoons Paprika
2 TBS. Garlic Powder
1 TBS. Onion Powder
2 TBS. Dried Minced Onions
1/2 TBS. Cayenne (red) Pepper
1 teaspoon Oregano or Cilantro
1 teaspoon Sugar
1 teaspoon Salt 

Here's what you do:

Dump all ingredients into a jar. Put lid on jar. Shake vigorously. Voila, homemade taco seasoning mix. Store in an airtight container (I use an empty spice bottle). Add 2-3 tablespoons of seasoning per 1 pound of ground meat and 3/4 cup of water.